


24/07/19: what to do with change

by excelsi_or



Series: to a boy i love right now [13]
Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Tiny bit of Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:33:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24097378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/excelsi_or/pseuds/excelsi_or
Summary: Her new intern position is freaking her out. Jihoon has fallen off the face of the earth since his new job.
Relationships: Lee Jihoon | Woozi/Original Female Character(s)
Series: to a boy i love right now [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1252010
Kudos: 8





	24/07/19: what to do with change

_July 24_

“How _is_ he though?” Seungkwan demands.

She shrugs, running around the kitchen like a headless chicken. She has a piece of toast in her mouth and an apple in one hand. Her phone is on as she checks the time, the time she needs to leave getting closer and closer.

It’s the start of her second month at her summer intern position and the last thing she wants to do is screw it up. She’s been on edge since starting there and Seungkwan is starting to get worried. One, because the woman hasn’t said anything about Jihoon in the last month and a half. And two, because he can’t remember a time when he’s seen his composed roommate look so on edge. He grabs her shoulders to stop her from almost spinning.

“Noona, you need to breathe.”

Her breath is shaky as she tries to calm down. “There are literally so many things I think I’m forgetting.”

“You didn’t sleep last night again, did you?”

She huffs and spins around. Seungkwan catches the crazy eye. Without Hansol around, it’s difficult to calm her down these days. He has no idea what’s going on with Jihoon, if they’ve broken up or what, but this seems to be a storm he has to weather on his own. Seungkwan follows her through their apartment. He collects her stuff together, picking up little things that she’s forgetting.

Like her wallet.

And her hat.

And the report she spent all of last night finishing.

Seungkwan winces when she glosses over that last one. She’s really not in her right mind. “Noona, are you sure you’re okay? You don’t want me to go with you to the work site? I can at least ride on the bus with you.”

She shakes her head, trying (and failing) to take deep breaths. She puts everything in her backpack and exhales loudly when Seungkwan hands over the things she’d forgotten. She closes her eyes and really tries to center herself. That is until her phone alarm begins blaring telling her she needs to leave. Right now.

“I’ll be fine, Seungkwanie, really.” She smiles at him, though it’s strained. “You should really go home. Visit your family in Jeju.”

Seungkwan shakes his head. “No. I told Hansol that I’d wait for him to come home first.”

She nods and hurries out of the apartment.

Since his graduation and starting at his new company, no one has really heard anything from Jihoon. Seungkwan calls Hansol, checking the time to make sure it’s not an unearthly hour in New York.

It still is, but he lets it ring through.

Hansol’s face appears on the screen. His eyes are half open and his hair is a mess. “Seungkwan? What’s going on? Is everything okay?”

“Noona just left here a complete mess. She won’t talk about Jihoon hyung and I don’t know what to do.”

Hansol becomes significantly more alert at the mention of her. “I’ve only been gone a month. What’s happened?”

Seungkwan runs through the whirlwind of the intern position and the lack of communication from Jihoon. “You know them. She lets Jihoon do everything in his own time, but if he gets wrapped up in his music again—”

“He’s gonna wind up the same Jihoon hyung before they were dating,” Hansol agrees. He runs a hand over his face. “I’ll see what I can do. I won’t be home until next month. Will you guys be okay?”

“If you answer my calls at all hours,” Seungkwan chuckles, “yes.”

During her ride home, her head falls against the window as her eyes flutter closed. At least until her phone starts ringing.

She quickly answers it. “Hello?” she mumbles.

“Noona?”

It takes her a beat to recognize the voice. Since Hansol went to New York and she hasn’t really seen Jihoon in a few months, she hasn’t heard from Mingyu. “Gyu, what’s going on?”

“Everything’s fine, noona,” he laughs. “I just wanted to see how you were doing.”

She sighs in relief. “Fine. I’m good. Tired.”

“Are you up for going to dinner?”

“Dinner?” She pauses to gauge her energy level. “Sure. Where?”

She detours past her house, getting off two stops later. She looks around at the familiar surroundings. It feels like ages since she’s been in Jihoon’s neighbourhood. Mingyu greets her at the bus stop and wraps an arm around her shoulders. “Are you shrinking, noona? I swear you weren’t this short before.”

She snorts, smacking him in the chest. “Oh, shut up. You need to stop growing.” She looks up at him, smiling at the familiarity of him. “How are you doing, Gyu?”

“Good. I’m working near campus for the summer. That bulgogi place that hyung likes.”

“Oh,” she hums. “That’s good. They pay you well?”

“Enough to survive until my scholarship kicks in again,” he chuckles. He asks her about her new job; about all the people she’s met. They walk to a nearby hot pot restaurant on his street and they find themselves in a booth at the back.

“You don’t come around anymore,” Mingyu says once they’ve ordered.

He’s done an excellent job of avoiding the subject this long. Unfortunately, she has no real response for him.

“I know. Life has been getting in the way.” She toys with her napkin, folding it into triangles and then spreading it out again.

“Noona.”

She lifts her gaze to meet his.

“He’s just really busy. He’s hardly home.”

She nods her head. “I know. He sends me a text on occasion.”

“Hyung also doesn’t do well with change,” Mingyu informs her. “New things really scare the crap out of him.”

“Yeah.”

Mingyu takes a sip of water and continues. “Hyung has this thing where he needs to be completely comfortable with the new thing before he can adjust his life around it.” He understands her confused expression. “I just don’t want you to think that hyung’s forgotten about you.”

“No. I don’t think that.” She sighs. “I just miss him.”

“And you should. You have every right to.”

“I feel like an inconvenience to him, so I just don’t text him anymore.”

Mingyu runs a hand through his hair, blowing the air out of his cheeks. “He thought you were mad at him.”

“What?”

“Sometimes he gets in late at night and we’ll talk for a while and you’ll come up.” Mingyu shrugs. “He thinks that you’ve stopped talking to him, because you’re mad about him being busy. So he said he’ll wait for you to come around.”

She hums. “I’m a little mad.”

“He’s home, if you’re wondering.”

She sighs. Her life without Jihoon has been a whirlwind and she’s tired. Life with Jihoon feels like a lifetime ago now.

“He doesn’t know I’m with you. He thinks I’m with Wonwoo hyung.”

“Isn’t he—?”

“Working as a lyricist for a small company, yeah. He’s freelancing on the side.”

“Meaning that he’s probably too busy to see you right now.”

“He’s working on his stuff, but yeah. He’s also too busy right now. Perfect excuse,” Mingyu chuckles.

Their food arrives, the broth bubbling and the smell intoxicating. She didn’t realize how hungry she was until the food was brought out. Mingyu motions for her to eat first.

An hour later, their conversation lightening during the meal, Mingyu insists on paying. They head back towards the bus stop, passing his apartment on the way.

“He _is_ home, noona,” Mingyu says, noting her slowing pace and her eyes on the doorway.

“But is he busy?”

“Always.”

She sighs and looks up at him. “Can I face him?”

“Hell yes you can!” Mingyu exclaims. “You’re the best thing to walk into his life, noona. Please go walk back into it.”

“Where are you going to go?”

“Bug Wonwoo hyung for a while,” he laughs. “He got an apartment close by so he could stop rooming with his university roommate.” Mingyu drags her to the front door and unlocks it for her. With a nudge, he says, “Go.”

The ride up to their floor is nostalgic. The smells are the same, the floral scent of their floor contrasting the musky smell of the elevator. The random flickering light halfway down the hallway still hasn’t been fixed. She can still hear that same tiny dog barking from the end of the hall. Then she’s standing in front of Jihoon’s apartment door; staring down at the welcome mat she made the two boys buy months ago.

Steeling her nerves, she forces herself inside.

The apartment looks different. The boys have rearranged their living room, shifting everything around. They even changed the curtains. She can hear music coming from Jihoon’s side of the apartment. She leaves her backpack by the door, slips out of her shoes, and follows the sound to Jihoon’s room.

She stands on the other side and listens closely. She doesn’t get to actually register the song as it stops. There’re a few beats of silence, and for a moment, she thinks he’s going to bed. Then _her voice_ fills the apartment.

She pushes the door open a bit. Jihoon is sat on his bed; his head leaned back against the wall, eyes closed.

“Ji…?” she whispers.

Jihoon’s body snaps upright and he stares at her like he’s seeing a ghost.

She pushes the door open further, waiting for a real reaction. She’s still dressed in her work clothes. She hadn’t had to go into the field today, so she looks mildly presentable.

“You look… uncomfortable,” he comments.

Her brow furrows, not exactly the first thing she wanted her boyfriend to say to her.

“I mean… since when do you dress like that?” Jihoon clears his throat awkwardly.

She glances down at the outfit. “Yeah, it’s not my favourite either. I wear it to work.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah.”

There’s a beat of silence and she lets her eyes pan around the room. Nothing is different. She wouldn’t expect there to be much change; Jihoon’s a creature of habit. “Are you… well?”

“Yeah, I’m… I should probably eat more, but work is busy. There’s a, uh, rookie group debuting soon? Got me working double time.”

She nods her head. She wants to step further into the room, but she also wants to bolt out of here because it feels so weird. This doesn’t even feel like the first time they met. Maybe she knows too much now for it to be like that.

“You’ve been well?” he asks.

She smiles, but even doing that takes a lot of effort. “Work’s trying to kill me.”

“Are you in a rush?”

She looks back towards the door. “No…”

Jihoon scoots to the edge of the bed, his laptop forgotten on the side. “Tell me all about it then.”

She stares at him. He looks the exact same as the last day she saw him. His face is a little gaunter, his jaw a little more defined. It’s only been a few months since they were properly together, but it feels so different. Slowly, she moves to sit in front of him on the floor and begins talking.

Before long, words are spilling out of her mouth, all the stresses she’s felt working the new job and the pressure she’s felt to do well. Jihoon, seemingly falling back into rhythm with her, shares his own anecdotes about work. They swap stories about difficult bosses and hilarious coworkers. He tells her about the rookies and idols he’s met and she updates him on their friends’ lives, as he apparently hasn’t really kept in touch with anyone.

She glances at her watch and grimaces when she notes that two hours have gone by. “I should really get home,” she says. “Gyu invited me out for dinner; I wasn’t supposed to be out for so long.”

“Oh, okay.” The disappointment in Jihoon’s voice is evident.

She hasn’t moved from her spot on the floor and it’s nice to just see Jihoon in person again. She wishes that he had come to join her or at least pulled her onto the bed, but she tries not to hope for too much so soon. She pushes herself to standing and he walks her to the door.

“How did you get in?”

“Gyu forced me inside,” she chuckles, scooping her backpack off the floor.

Jihoon hums. She slips into her shoes again and the two of them stare at each other, goodbyes hanging in the air.

“I hope you know I missed you,” he says quietly.

She nods her head. “I hope you know that I’m not mad that you didn’t text or call often.”

Jihoon takes a step towards her, his hands reaching for her waist. She lets him take the lead on this one, not wanting to push him further than he’d like to go. His eyes roam all over her features and his hands find their way underneath her work shirt, that she’d untucked while sitting on his floor. His palms are soft against her sides and she tips her head, wondering where in the world this is going.

Jihoon gives her a gentle tug towards him, pulling her body flush against his. He catches her lips in a kiss and she wastes no time giving his bottom lip a small nibble. Chuckling, he pulls away. “Well, I’m glad that’s not different.”

She smiles at him, her nerves dissolving completely. “You scared me, Lee Jihoon. I thought I was going to have to start all over with you.”

“You’re sure you can’t stay?”

“Text me the next time you’re home early, lover boy. I’ll sleep over.”

“I should have forewarned you that I’m really shitty with change.” His hands move to the small of her back, holding her in place.

“I knew, but I guess I just really didn’t _know_. We’ll work on it.”

Jihoon pecks her nose, lingering close to her face. “I’ll see you soon?”

She dips her head to kiss him quickly. “Yes, my love. I’ll come find you again soon.”


End file.
